Gender-Based Political Violence Against María Corina Machado’s Commitment and Resilience
This week, a group of chavistas attacked María Corina Machado and her team in Bolívar State. We know that nothing scares chavistas more than a brilliant, courageous, educated woman who threatens to overthrow a dictatorship with conviction and the power of her ideas of prosperity, peace, democracy and a better future for Venezuelans.
Photo: Libertad Digital retrieved
On Wednesday, once again, Machado was on the receiving end (because she’s no victim!) of a new act of violence perpetrated by the State. Indignación is what we feel after what happened the day before yesterday in the town of Upata, Bolívar State, when Machado, her team and two deputies from the Asamblea Nacional were brutally and ruthlessly attacked by regime supporters.
The reason for this new aggression? María Corina Machado is doing something that the chavista regime isn’t doing. She’s walking the walk, talking the talk. She carries the message that all Venezuelans deserve a prosperous and dignified life, and the right to live in a democracy. She’s visiting every town and every city in the country with a message of resilience and hope. She’s ready to give it all up to restore democracy and human rights in Venezuela.
María Corina Machado is doing something that the chavista regime isn’t doing. She’s walking the walk, talking the talk.
The attack perpetrated by a group of chavista thugs against her and her team is just one more piece of evidence of the state-led repression, and the severity of the democratic breakdown in Venezuela. No democratic country allows their opposition leaders to be attacked like this. No democratic country participates in the repression.
In the case of María Corina, we’ve covered the many attacks by the regime against her for being a leading voice against repression and the violation of human rights by the regime. She’s been assaulted in Caricuao, detained in Maiquetía, shoved in Chacao, attacked in Puerto Ordaz, assaulted in Turmero. Name the aggression, she’s suffered it.
Why? Because while she fights with ideas, the regime fights with palos and coercion. While she fights with conviction, they fight with fear of being revealed as dictators. They fear finally facing justice for what they’ve done.
While she fights with ideas, the regime fights with palos and coercion.
María Corina is also an empowered woman, with a political career and future. And the chavistas can’t take this either. The chavistas, with their so-called feminist discourse, have done nothing to improve the situation of women in Venezuela in any way. She has been on the receiving end of state-led violence and gender-based violence. According to UN Women, gender-based political violence is any “physical, psychological or sexual action, conduct and/or aggression committed by one person or a group of people, directly or through third parties, against women who are candidates, elected, designated or exercising a public/political role, or against their families, to reduce, suspend, prevent or restrict the exercise of their position or to induce or oblige them to carry out, against their will, an act or omission in the performance of their functions or in the exercise of their rights.”
If what happened to Machado and her team yesterday was not gender-based violence, I don’t know what is. You tell me.
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